{"id":489999,"date":"2023-05-04T07:33:54","date_gmt":"2023-05-04T05:33:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/?p=489999"},"modified":"2023-05-04T17:30:23","modified_gmt":"2023-05-04T15:30:23","slug":"samsung-faces-first-ever-worker-strike","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/business\/489999-samsung-faces-first-ever-worker-strike.html","title":{"rendered":"Samsung faces first-ever worker strike"},"content":{"rendered":"

Samsung Electronics Co. faces its first-ever labour strike after an influential union threatened to stage a walkout to protest wages and the company\u2019s alleged attempts to block labour organisation.<\/p>\n

The union, which says it represents about 9% of Samsung staff or about 10,000 employees, issued a statement Thursday accusing Korea\u2019s largest company of shutting its leaders out of salary negotiations.<\/p>\n

The union had previously asked for wage increases of more than 6% this year, in part to offset domestic inflation running at more than 4%.<\/p>\n

Samsung management announced last month a 4.1% hike for its highest performers and 2% for average workers for 2023, according to the union.<\/p>\n

A Samsung Electronics spokesperson wasn\u2019t immediately available for comment.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s unclear whether the organisation will follow through. But the worker unrest comes at a bad time for Samsung, which is struggling to cope with waning global demand for everything from memory chips to smartphones and appliances.<\/p>\n

Samsung, a proxy for the global tech economy, posted<\/a><\/strong>\u00a0a record $3.4 billion loss in its chip division alone for the March quarter.<\/p>\n

The union is also demanding that Samsung Chairman Jay Y. Lee join the discussions.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe will decide whether to go on strike after discussing with our 10,000 members,\u201d Lee Hyun Kuk, a representative of the National Samsung Electronics Union, said during a press conference in front of Samsung\u2019s building in Gangnam, Seoul.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt depends on the attitude of Chairman Jay Y. Lee. We sincerely ask him to come to the table for talks.\u201d<\/p>\n

If Samsung goes on a strike, the other 11 unions at Samsung Group affiliates such as builder Samsung C&T Corp or electric car battery maker Samsung SDI Co. will follow suit, said Oh Sang-Hoon, a union representative for Samsung Fire & Marine Insurance Co.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are not here just for a salary hike, but to protest against Samsung\u2019s crackdowns on the union,\u201d Oh said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe chairman apologised for a union-free management in 2020, but he still hasn\u2019t met with us.\u201d<\/p>\n

Asia\u2019s largest electronics company said last week it expected demand to only gradually improve in a range of markets from smartphones to PCs and storage, driven by a Chinese economic recovery and accelerating AI development.<\/p>\n

That could begin happening only from the second half of this year.<\/p>\n

South Korean unions are an influential voice in local politics and company strikes are not uncommon, but the walkout would be the first to hit Samsung since its 1969 founding.<\/p>\n

Samsung\u2019s unions secured the right to strike last year after wage talks failed, but didn\u2019t follow through.<\/p>\n

Thursday\u2019s action began after talks between Samsung and union leaders fell through this week. A government agency helping arbitrate the negotiations halted discussions after failing to resolve that deadlock, the Korea Herald reported Wednesday.<\/p>\n

The union negotiation body this time initially wanted a 10% wage hike before proposing various options including a premium over rivals or a lump-sum payment, according to the newspaper.<\/p>\n

Samsung last month agreed to an average increase this year of about 4%, but the union argues that deal was inadequate and bypassed the labour organisation.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\n

Now read: Samsung bans staff from using ChatGPT<\/a><\/h2>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

South Korean unions are an influential voice in local politics and company strikes are not uncommon, but the walkout would be the first to hit Samsung since its 1969 founding.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":341034,"featured_media":463547,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sma_x_autopost_status":"idle","_sma_x_autopost_error":"","_sma_x_post_id":"","_sma_facebook_post_id":"","_sma_instagram_post_id":"","_sma_threads_post_id":"","_sma_x_attempts":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[41766,61923,645,1549,39322,82337],"class_list":["post-489999","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business","tag-jay-y-lee","tag-labour-unions","tag-samsung","tag-south-korea","tag-tech-companies","tag-worker-strike"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/489999"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/341034"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=489999"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/489999\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":490001,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/489999\/revisions\/490001"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/463547"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=489999"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=489999"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=489999"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}